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Saw some more "2016, you suck" memes this morning and figured it'd be cool if we had a thread to share our good news.

Have a baby, get married, buy a new house, record an album, score your dream gear, have a build you're especially proud of, find an album you love?

If it made you happy, then let 'er rip.

For me, I landed a really great job in Washington state and it's a whole new environment - upbeat office working with great people and more scenic adventures than I have time for. Not to mention I met an amazing woman right off the bat. Picked out an engagement ring. Haven't pulled the trigger yet, but it's going to be soon.

Demo sounds really good, including the distortion. Love to see what's inside it. Description says the volume stays unity as gain increases. I'm suspicious it's VCA based.

Finally bit the bullet and got a 4-channel scope - Rigol DS1054DZ. Lots of praise for a lower-end scope.

Um, I'm going Tesla ...

Interesting thread going on at FSB about JFET circuit designs. Soulsonic posted a biasing setup that looks really interesting - the point being you can set the DC bias with minimal effect on the AC.


Here's a link to the thread

Since there are some parts that are only available in SMD packages these days, I'm wondering where everyone stands and what the interest would be for projects that are mostly through hole, but would require a few SMD components (Transistors and ICs).


Made the voting so you can change your answer later if you change your mind.

This look like a lot more fun than a hot glue gun. I think I'm going to give it a try.

Anyone able to recommend a good, affordable stripper for doing ribbon cable?

Just saw today that Surfy Bear has a new mini SMD version.
$69 for an assembled board and it's the size of a typical 1590B circuit. Interesting thing is he added an opamp servo biasing system for the JFETs.


Here's the link.

Looong time in the planning/making, but a huge payoff. Sounds fantastic and gives you the saucer-plate eyes when you goose it with a booster. Wowser.


Followed the build doc and everything went together really smoothly except for a couple minor wiring goofs. (There's a lotta wiring). My main tip is to use the DMM to check each connection isn't grounding out as you solder it just to be sure some little shielding hair isn't touching something it shouldn't.


The light-up toobs are a bit tricky. I took the sockets completely apart to get the center pin out and all pins flew everywhere. Got them back together and epoxied. Stuck LEDs in the sockets and wired them to the heater supply and to the Optoshield and voila - light show!

OK, I think this is one I have to have ...New Digitech TRIO. Apparently, it works kind of like a looper pedal, except instead of playing back your guitar, it adds drums and bass to play along with.


It hasn't been released yet, but I saw the price is going to be $179.

I've been blabbering about this circuit for a long while and finally got it boxed up proper. It's Juan & Cleggy's Super Judge on a super layout by Rullywowr.
Couple mods - changed the Volume pot to 100KA and changed C6 to a slightly lower value (don't remember which one now). Tried a few opamps and settled on the LM833.


I also used one of my new mini 3PDT breakout boards with the huminating/decoupling.


Really had a blast playing with this today. It sounds even better in the box - like how your car runs better when it's clean. Pure 70s garage rawk. Raunchy and fun.


When I saw the name of the circuit, I knew I had to do a muscle-carish theme. Classic GTOs are one of my favorites. I tried to do this Cody style (love your stuff, Cody) - reverse etch & paint - with limited success. I'm a disaster with rattle cans and sandpaper. Oh well. Instead of a cherry GTO it's one that's seen a few drive-in door dings. It's hard to see in the pic, but the knob labels do stand out pretty well.

Picked up an MXR 6-Band EQ off Craigslist yesterday for $30 and found it to be a hiss monster. Some quick google-fu revealed this to be a common complaint and someone offers a modding service to replace the opamps, which their demo video shows to be an appreciable improvement.


I just ordered a pair of SMD quad opamps from Mouser  - OPA1664 like in this blog (link).


Anyone have a preferred method for removing SMD opamps without a hot-air station? I've tried it with a regular wide-mouth heat gun before and it didn't go so well.

At Musicians friend today - for the Gloss black.


Linky

[Keefage!]

It took a few months - and a year of doing more FET overdrive layouts - but I've rebuilt the Bubba FET to make it much more betterer.

EDIT: Thought I should give this some more context. This is a rebuild of what I called the 'Bubba Fet' last year. It's 5 of my favorite FET-based gain pedals and a booster. There's a switch for the Klon (booster) and bypass for the Fet circuits. THe middle switch cycles through the 5 different effects.


Here's a link to the original build report.


Changelog:


Keefage!
Swapped out the Umble for a Lamprey (SVT workalike). The Umble never really moved me and I wasn't using it at all, so I had a year of 'tryouts,' doing layouts for different JFET drives and the SVT got the starting role. It really shines at both low and high-gain sounds.


Moar voltage!
The Blackbird, Lamprey, Plexi and Voxey Brown each got their own Road Rage with a 15V regulator, with the Black and Plexi rebiased at the higher voltage. JFETs really do sound better with more than 9V. I tried the RAH (mosfets) at 15V, but I actually preferred it at 9V.


Switcher switcheroo!
I did a new layout for the switching circuit for better and quieter operation. The inputs and outputs of each circuit are grounded on bypass, the switching and signal grounds are separated and I added big ground pads for using with shielded wire.


Wiring fanciness!
I got some 4-conductor shielded wire from Redco and used it for each effect and the input/output jacks. I also got busy with the hot glue gun and all the connections are really cemented together for stress relievin'. It wasn't very noisy before, but it's eerily dead silent now - and I LOVE that.


Capacitor insanity!
There are NO ceramic caps in this thing any more. I had to wait 6 weeks for the last few polystyrene caps from Hungary, so now all those small values are polystyrene. I did some A/B testing and the difference isn't 100% completely imperceptible. The biggest improvement comes when using them in treble-bypass positions, like on gain pots - and it's indeed small, but my philosophy more and more is that if I'm going through the trouble and expense, might as well go through the extra trouble and expense for the best.


Better Bypassin'
I replaced the relay switching (PedalSync chips) with 1776effect optotron bypass boards. The relay boards didn't make a popping noise, but the mute function really did sound like a hiccup in the signal and it was bugging me.


Moar Mojo!
The SHO was honestly kind of boring as a boost. After trying a few, I decided to go with a Silver Pony Klone and it's the balls. Really a superb EQ'd boost that sounds just perfect pushing these JFET ODs. Then, crank up the gain on the Pony and it gets monstrous. Again, poly and film caps in the Klone signal path with OPA2134 opamps and the BYOC-approved Russian diodes. I also made the Pony switch independently from the other circuits so I can use it on its own if I want to.


Faceplate frustration!
I tried TWO more rounds of etching new faceplates and never really liked the results. Instead, I glued photo paper on them and coated with epoxy. I think it looks pretty good, put I'm not overly thrilled with them.


The Results:
It took a lot of work, but definitely worth the effort. The sounds and functionality are greatly improved and it's super quiet even at high gains. Not to mention it's far more solidly put together inside. If anyone's thinking about a 2-in-1 drive pedal, I really have to recommend a Silver Pony Klone into a Blackbird (Black '65). It's just an amazing combo and insanely versatile.


Here are some cell phone pics. Gah, I really need a better camera.

Yup, way off topic.
I'm taking a trip to the mountains this week and I'd like to take my 8-year-old nephew a cool present. Thing is, I don't have kids and I'm rarely around kids, so I'm way out of the know.


I don't want to get him a 'toy' exactly. He's pretty set on toys, anyway. My first impulse is a pocket knife - thinking back to what id've thought would be awesome at that age. Sis says 'nah' on that idea. Pfft, moms ...

Just saw the demo and it sounds really great. What really got my attention was how much it sounds like Juan's Super Judge. 

A coworker's uncle died and left him all his hi-fi equipment and I scored a free TEAC 4010S Reel-to-reel. He was going to give the whole lot for $50 - including a Marantz amp and some other stuff and I had to have a conscience and tell him that stuff is worth a good chunk of money. I think he said he got $700. I got the R2R, though.


Amazingly enough, I found a video of a guy using this exact model for a guitar delay. 


I don't want to spend a ton getting it going since it's a novelty, so I'm wondering if I could just hack a Zero Point Micro to run its loop through the R2R instead of the PT2399.